Saturday, February 7, 2015

CSU, do you even freedom of association, bro?

California State University announced last Fall that it would derecognize InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. InterVarsity is a nationwide evangelical student organization whose CSU chapters refused to file a required nondiscrimination declaration with student affairs offices.

In order to enjoy the benefits of University recognition, student groups must declare that membership and leadership positions are open to any enrolled student. InterVarsity refused to file the declaration. The group requires students who hold leadership positions – positions that may involve teaching and ministering to members – to affirm its traditional views on Biblical Christianity.

The move to enforce this “all comers” policy harms meaningful freedom of association on CSU campuses. It means that College Democrats may not require members to maintain a commitment to progressive causes in order to be eligible for leadership positions. They must be open even to conservative NASCAR fans. College Republicans may not require a commitment to conservative principles of its leaders. An influx of evangelistic Nancy-Pelotheists could undermine its mission. Likewise, the new policy opens leadership positions in the Secular Student Alliance to faith healers, those in the Queer-Straight Alliance to homophobes and those in the Environmental Student Organization to climate change deniers.

These would be unwelcome developments. Universities advance their educational goals in part by promoting a diverse and vibrant intellectual community among students. Meaningfully free inquiry requires universities to afford its students wide-ranging opportunities to associate freely in their pursuit of academic and practical ideals and values. But such pursuit requires the ability of these associations to exclude others – yes, discriminate – on “doctrinal” grounds that are relevant to the group’s distinctive mission. When CSU forbids this, and when it derecognizes InterVarsity, it advertises the fact that its goal is not to foster an environment where all sorts of ideas can be investigated openly and fairly. It suggests its goal is to impose a specific idea about what falls within the bounds of legitimate investigation on campus.

Of course, the CSU doesn’t really forbid all discrimination on grounds that are relevant to a group’s mission. Sensibly enough, the policy already carves out exceptions for some student organizations. And, should students engage in the kind of shenanigans I speculate about above, university administrators would likely intervene to protect organizations with aims and values that they regard as legitimate. InterVarsity is not among those. Nor perhaps are other organizations, religious or otherwise, that are observant, unpopular or weird enough to make people uncomfortable.

Large or wildly popular groups will not be affected at all by the new policy. They have statements of purpose that the masses either resoundingly endorse or do not really care about one way or the other. So club sports and groups like the Anti-Cancer Society and the Society for the Appreciation of Beer Pong will do just fine in the new campus environment. Groups like these don’t need to require a set of specific affirmations from members or leaders in order to pursue their organizational missions.

Many other groups don’t have broad popular support on campus. They have distinctive aims and values, some of which are fairly controversial, which they seek to further through their organizational activities. Such groups – those with political affiliations, social justice concerns or ethnic identities – likely can reliably count on benevolent university administrators to protect their organizational missions, at least for now.

Disfavored organizations cannot, and so far we know this includes InterVarsity at CSU. But this is not true everywhere. For example, Ohio State University provides an exemption to accommodate religious organizations like InterVarsity so that “A student organization formed to foster or affirm the sincerely held religious beliefs of its members may adopt eligibility criteria for its Student Officers that are consistent with those beliefs.” CSU should do the same. The effect of this alternative way forward would be to treat religious groups the way CSU already treats other student groups that have a distinctive mission.

Protecting open inquiry only for those with officially sanctioned views runs counter to the traditionally recognized aims of a university. If students on CSU campuses have genuine freedom of association in order to promote intellectual inquiry, this entails that they can exclude others. When they do, their reasons may seem unfair, arbitrary or worse to at least some people. But when this is forbidden, freedom of association is meaningless and intellectual inquiry becomes a kind of ideological conformity-lite.

14 comments:

Kyle, thanks for this piece on a matter that should be really important to Sac State students.

I am going to speculate that the recommendation you endorse above is more of a political solution for you than a philosophical one. I am also going to guess, despite your libertarian tendencies, that you are not completely against any kind of non discrimination policy. Probably you would not write in defense of the Beer Pong club wanting to exclude teetotalers. So what, in your view, would a really well-crafted non discrimination policy look like?

My own tendency would be to leave it stand as is and eliminate all the exceptions. If the atheist club came complaining to me that Christians and Muslims were showing up at their meetings making atheists very uncomfortable by arguing against atheism, and some were even trying to run for office, I would just say, yeah?, deal with it. I don't think public universities should have any interest in making any set of beliefs or practices comfortable for anyone. I know that this allows the logical possibility of the group being flooded and hijacked, but I think that's the point at which you rely on the administration to step in and put a stop to it on the grounds that any group that actually does that is not trying to foster freedom of association and expression, but inhibit it. Hopefully you will find my attitude as being incredibly insensitive to atheists, who are one of the most hated minorities in the universe.

Well, the recommendation is based on a kind of argument about (1) the good of open and free pursuit of diverse ideas and ideals, (2) the need in the case of at least some of them to outline and adhere to a distinctive and particular (and even perhaps peculiar) mission and (3) the role universities appropriately play in encouraging these diverse pursuits. I read you as rejecting 3. I think that’s sensible. But that’s very different than what the CSU is doing, because they affirm the heck out of 3. So I think the best explanation of what they’re doing is making decisions about which groups are worthy of it. I think that’s kind of dangerous. But about my recommendation: I really don’t think the Ohio State policy is necessary. I think the CSU had a perfectly fine policy before issuing the Executive Order 1068 (is there any evidence that it wasn’t perfectly fine?). I don’t know why you think the one your propose (the one with no exceptions except when administrators decide to step in) is better.

That makes sense. I don't think I reject 3, but I definitely don't AHOOI it. I think we encourage it to the extent that we permit the groups to exist and let them apply for funding. I AHOOI the idea that universities are a place for the free exchange of ideas and that nobody should be protected from it. There are plenty of other places where people can go to get that.

Great post Kyle, and obviously relevant! I think this is a very complex issue. As I see it, there are a few competing goals/values at stake, and the difficulty of whether there should be a firm rule or the possibility for judgements about particular cases.

I see the university as having some pastoral duties to its students, as well as the goal of providing them a thoroughgoing education that includes exposing them to a diverse range of ideas. Furthermore, unjust discrimination should be avoided at all costs. This is for the benefit of the students who might be discriminated against and the community as a whole.

Balancing all of these considerations is not easy. Imagine the following case. A religious club has a policy that it's leaders must follow the text of some document. The text is clear that females are not to hold positions of religious authority. The club has been established for a long time and has garnered substantial resources that are the property of the club. The leaders of the club have been involved for a long time and have helped the club to amass the property it possesses. A new female member of the club keeps asking if the club can have a debate on the issue of females being in positions of religious authority in their religion and in the club. The current leaders of the club refuse and suggest she starts her own club. Another fairly new club member has recently coveted to the religion, is having trouble in many areas of his life, and feels like the religious support and social security of the club is helping him hang in there. Would it be best for the university to require that the club follow the strict non-discrimination policy?

It's not possible to please everyone in this situation. I'm also unsure what is the best thing to do overall. What is the most important value to the university, and what should it be?

Given the clash of possibly incommensurate values, a situation by situation policy might seem like the best overall strategy, but given the influence of donors at so many universities, combined with the personal biases of the people in the relevant positions of power within universities, I do not have a lot of faith in such a process regularly getting it right.

So, I think we can't resolve this problem without some agreement on what the core goal of the university should be in regard to clubs.

Great post Kyle, and obviously relevant! I think this is a very complex issue. As I see it, there are a few competing goals/values at stake, and the difficulty of whether there should be a firm rule or the possibility for judgements about particular cases.

I see the university as having some pastoral duties to its students, as well as the goal of providing them a thoroughgoing education that includes exposing them to a diverse range of ideas. Furthermore, unjust discrimination should be avoided at all costs. This is for the benefit of the students who might be discriminated against and the community as a whole.

Balancing all of these considerations is not easy. Imagine the following case. A religious club has a policy that it's leaders must follow the text of some document. The text is clear that females are not to hold positions of religious authority. The club has been established for a long time and has garnered substantial resources that are the property of the club. The leaders of the club have been involved for a long time and have helped the club to amass the property it possesses. A new female member of the club keeps asking if the club can have a debate on the issue of females being in positions of religious authority in their religion and in the club. The current leaders of the club refuse and suggest she starts her own club. Another fairly new club member has recently coveted to the religion, is having trouble in many areas of his life, and feels like the religious support and social security of the club is helping him hang in there. Would it be best for the university to require that the club follow the strict non-discrimination policy?

It's not possible to please everyone in this situation. I'm also unsure what is the best thing to do overall. What is the most important value to the university, and what should it be?

Given the clash of possibly incommensurate values, a situation by situation policy might seem like the best overall strategy, but given the influence of donors at so many universities, combined with the personal biases of the people in the relevant positions of power within universities, I do not have a lot of faith in such a process regularly getting it right.

So, I think we can't resolve this problem without some agreement on what the core goal of the university should be in regard to clubs.

Kyle, I agree with you and Randy that this is an important issue. I don't have a well-formed opinion on it, but here are some thoughts.

I think of freedom of association as what people sometimes call a negative right. If I wish to hang out with fellow beer-pong enthusiasts, for otherwise lawful purposes, then my freedom of association implies that I can expect to do so without interference, e.g. the government would be wrong to stop me. But the issue here seems to be whether a particular group should be provided with something- meeting facilities etc- and to be provided with it, in this case, by the government, since the CSU is a state institution. If my freedom of association with fellow beer-pongers implies that I have a right to be provided with meeting facilities, then that sounds more like what some would call a positive right.

Well, perhaps we should just say that in some cases, freedom of association implies a right to be provided with something. (I’m not entirely confident about the distinction between positive and negative rights.) But now a second observation occurs to me; you suggest that freedom of association on the part of a particular group involves a right on the part of that group to exclude others from participating in its activities.

Ordinarily I would think of the freedom of association, and the freedom to exclude others, as being two very different things. But perhaps they are not. As you observe, such exclusion might be necessary in order to further the associational aims of a group like the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (IVCF). I would put it this way: It might be the case that, for some reason, there would be no point in the members of IVCF associating with one another if they could not exclude others from their activities. The members of IVCF wish to meet in order to do (x), and if they cannot exclude others, they cannot effectively do (x).

So here is my question. If I have understood your position so far, then which aims do you think IVCF might be unable to realize if (say) Hindus were allowed to participate? Would IVCF no longer be able to discuss Christianity at their meetings? I understand that any discussion of Hindu practice at an IVCF meeting might be out of order and I don't see any problem with limiting such meetings to discussion of Christian principles and practice. But surely this can be done with Hindus present, and even with Hindus running for elected office. (The election of a Hindu in such circumstances seems unlikely, unless the group is overrun by Hindus; is this part of your concern?)

What I think IVCF might be seeking in their on-campus meetings is to cultivate feelings of Christian solidarity and to strengthen the commitment of its members to Christian principles and practice; the presence of outsiders might interfere with that, particularly if that meant that debate about the value of Christian practice might arise. And you mention that those who hold leadership positions in the IVCF might be called on to minister to others. But what is at stake now seems quite removed from any fostering of intellectual diversity. Indeed the exclusion seems motivated by an interest, if anything, in intellectual homogeneity. The pursuit of IVCF's aims, worthwhile as these might be, does not seem to be fully intellectual in character, and it's not clear to me that a (secular) state institution has any obligation to provide IVCF with the means to accomplish them.

You seem to have a somewhat broader mission in mind for the university than I do when you say that it ought to "afford its students wide-ranging opportunities to associate freely in their pursuit of academic and *practical ideals and values*” (emphasis mine). Perhaps my conception of the University’s mission is too narrow. But there must be some kind of limit on what sort of practical aims the university is called on to facilitate. I wouldn’t say, for example, that the university has any obligation to furnish facilities to a for-profit business enterprise. So what should that limit be?

I guess I’m not concerned too much with what we call it. If you don’t want to call it freedom of association because freedom of association is a purely negative right and I’m recommending that the university play a positive role – ok, we can call it something else. In any case, I do think that universities do appropriately play a role in encouraging all sorts of value inquiry. I’m also ok with the way you frame the real issue -- whether the CSU should, as a state institution, be providing this. But if it is going to provide certain benefits to student groups, I think it’s appropriate to worry about the conditions they impose having a disproportionately negative effect on some of them.

About your question: IV doesn’t ask Hindus or anyone else not to attend or participate at their meetings. They require those in leadership positions to affirm its doctrinal statement. I can’t speak with any authority about what goes on at these meetings, but I’d be surprised if they’re just having discussions about Christian principles and practice, which any relevantly informed person could lead regardless of religion (just like I’d be surprised if College Democrats are just having discussions about Democratic principles and practice, which any relevantly informed person could lead regardless of political affiliation). I doubt that very many of our campus student groups are "fully intellectual in character".

I respect the idea that, as a state institution, the university should only associate itself with groups that discriminate on grounds of a secular and non-prejudicial nature. However, Kyle also brings up a good point: is this, in practice, how groups are generally run? Does the IVCF receiving this attention constitute an unfair discrimination on the part of the university?

I don't know whether it is or not, I'm just providing my reactions as a student attempting to transfer to CSUS in the Fall. One could easily make the argument that, despite it being unfair, it is better half a loaf than none at all. I might rebuttal, then, that it is not better if this "crack-down" is going to stop at the IVCF if there are other offending parties that go unnoticed.

I would suppose the issue is more about what is on the books than is what is put into practice. An atheist group would not likely have a religious leader because of bias by the individuals within the group when electing them. We might be able to change the system in the abstract (and it is a start) but changing a person or group's behavior is a whole other thing seeing as they are mostly voluntary associations.

It strikes me that, with consideration of what David said about the real aims of the IVCF (and if those are its true aims), then it would be better if it was supported financially by a church or their own members instead of by a secular institution for the advancement of people intellectually. Even though one could argue that they support the aims of intellectual advancement through the exposition of Christian faith, it is not necessary a leader be a believer in that particular faith if they wish to effectively explore it in an intellectual manner that's appropriate for association with an educational institution.

I re-read your response Kyle and realized you already affirmed that anyone could lead a Christian group in religious inquiry in an intellectual capacity. I apologize for the redundancy of the latter paragraph in my previous response.

Kyle, I like your post and generally agree with the value of allowing groups to discriminate to some extent with regard to their leadership, in the ways you suggest relevant here. However, I worry, as most liberals do, about the supposition that groups are ideologically or theistically or culturally (or whatever) monolithic, uniform, and coherent. That's simply not the case. As we know, groups based in religious doctrine or political doctrine, or even culture and tradition, are riddled with internal minority opinions/practices and dominance structures. As such, their identity is often contested and in flux. A woman might want to join and lead a catholic religious group, but that might not sit well with more traditional male members who take the pope and church as models of rectitude and order. Similarly, a man might want to join and take a leadership role in the campus women’s group, etc. The challenge of requiring non-discrimination for groups who believe their interests are promoted by discriminating is that it seems to put them under pressure of risking the loss of their identity and purpose. But, another way to see the same mountain, so to speak, is to rise to the challenge of being open, welcoming, and risking diversity, even if it means having to have those precious and high-stakes internal dialogues about what exactly it means to be a member of X group, and what exactly X group is about. Those are exactly the values you suggest ought to be promoted at a university – to foster the kind of inquiry and meaning in identity that should be modeled in the rest of the world, at least the liberal world.

Where churches ban gay practitioners from full participation because they are gay, should not a university campus require that a student’s sexual orientation not be the deciding factor whether to be welcomed or not, whether to be a leader or not. That gay student might otherwise be incredibly devout in exactly the way members claim they praise… if only they could get past the gayness. Shouldn’t we be encouraging our students to get past it, or at least to have an open dialogue about it, not simply to mirror the same discrimination found elsewhere? Similarly, for the Muslim who is atheist-curious, should she be allowed to participate in the atheists group, including potentially running for office? Her doing so might prompt the group into exactly a discussion of what it means to be atheist and Muslim and whether or how to combine them. It would surprise me that in such a hypothetical such an individual would consider staying in the group, let alone leading it, but why not allow the possibility? Wouldn’t that be a dialogue worth supporting among student atheists and Muslims, among the homosexual and the Christian, the women and the men?

Anecdotally, when I was a grad student, my friend and I started a campus women’s group. Upon learning some men were interested in joining, and being in a feminist-separatist mode, I hoped to exclude them as one place where men just didn’t have to be at the table. Alas, I was out-voted by the rest of the membership, whether or not we would have been precluded from being discriminatory by university policy. It took a little while, but not long, for me to realize that exclusion wasn’t necessary. The kind of men the group attracted were strongly feminist and turned out to be among the most supportive and vocal of our members. To me, they will always remain “The Men’s Auxiliary” (a badge they worse in humourous honour of all the “Women’s Auxiliary X’s” throughout history), but the internal dialogue we had, both procedural and ideological, turned out to be much more important in the overall development and success of the group than would have been the case were I successful in my exclusionary efforts. Isn’t that what university is really about – providing a haven for internal and external dialogue, not presumptively justified exclusion and discrimination.

Yes I absolutely agree that those kinds of discussions and values should be promoted at a university ("what exactly it means to be a member of X group, and what exactly X group is about"). CSU should be a place where students can do *all sorts* of things. And so I also think it's appropriate, and even really important, that groups who maybe think they've nailed that stuff down already to pursue their distinctive mission. I think this even if they're wrong about having really nailed it down.

In other words, it should be fine, I think, for a group make some fixed assumptions about their inquiry and mission and proceed from there. All groups already do that.

I have a separate argument relevant to this IV-CSU case, which is, in a way, supportive of what Kyle says here in his blog post.

While I first sketched this argument in the Fall of 2014, shortly after the case was made public, I’ve been keeping an eye out since then for a place to discuss it. Perhaps Kyle and others here will have something to say about it.

It’s an argument that the controversial decision by the CSU—apart from any of its other philosophically objectionable aspects—was not even necessary to begin with.

For context, this is important because, as several pieces linked to the InterVarsity updates page in Fall of 2014 showed (http://www.intervarsity.org/page/california-state-university-system), some university representatives were saying that the CSU had no choice and that its position was necessary.

For example, this linked interview (http://www.tothesource.org/9_19_2014/9_19_2014.htm ) had the following exchange:

“tts: How are Inter Varsity campus leaders responding to these challenges?Jao: We're responding in a number of ways…We're continuing to engage with members of the Chancellor's office. They claim they are hand-tied by state laws. We have invited the chancellor to ask Sacramento to amend the policy.”

So, then. Here is my version of this “no it is not necessary” argument…

California State University’s recent choice to “de-recognize” InterVarsity Christian Fellowship—for not conforming to the new chancellor’s interpretation of the old chancellor’s statement of the university’s new anti-discrimination policy for student groups—was unwise.

IV requires its student leaders to affirm their Christian doctrine statement. So CSU chancellor Timothy White interpreted IV as running afoul of the “religion” and “leadership” parts of former chancellor Charles Reed’s 2011 executive order 1068:

“No campus shall recognize any fraternity, sorority, living group, honor society, or other student organization unless its membership and leadership are open to all currently enrolled students at that campus…”

Was it really necessary to de-recognize IV? The next statements of 1068 suggest not:

“The prohibition on membership policies that discriminate on the basis of gender does not apply to social fraternities or sororities or other university living groups.”

“…except that a social fraternity or sorority or other university living group may impose a gender limitation as permitted by Title 5, California Code of Regulations, Section 41500. Student organizations may require applicants for leadership positions to have been members for a specified period of time, and may require officers to compete for those positions in elections of the membership.”

Why is this relevant to IV? Compare: on White’s interpretation, if frats require members to submit to elections to become leaders, and to be members for 4 years before applying to lead, and to be male for membership, all that—combined—is not enough for prohibited discrimination. But if groups merely require that leaders believe some doctrine of divine election (like “God chooses people”), that—by itself—is enough for prohibited discrimination, and de-recognition, even if the group welcomes as members and leaders students of any gender from the moment they arrive on campus.

It’s hard to believe the authors of 1068 or 41500 meant for this to happen.

1068’s stated exceptions were never meant as exhaustive: surely if an “honor society” required leaders have high grade point averages, such “discrimination” wouldn’t be prohibited. Surely if a religious student cried “discrimination” against a student group requiring its leaders believe some secular claim that she views as against her religion, 1068’s “discriminates on the basis of…religion” wouldn’t be unfavorably interpreted against the group. The same considerations should apply for IV.

And even if it was necessary to interpret 1068 so unfavorably, it wasn’t necessary for 1068 to interpret CR 41500 so unfavorably. A casual glance at 41500 shows that it’s even harder to believe its authors intended the CSU to de-recognize belief-based communities like IV.

So then: I think we should urge chancellor White to re-recognize IV by superseding executive order 1068 with another stating that the CSU will either exempt belief-based communities (like Ohio State did recently) or interpret “discriminates on the basis of…religion” in ways that protect belief-based communities, until clearly instructed otherwise by the legislature.

I also think we should urge the California legislature to amend Title 5 to clearly exempt belief-based communities like IV in the same way it clearly exempts the Greek system, so that future chancellors will have explicit guidance to protecting such communities. Simply insert a sentence into CCR 41500 immediately after the parallel sentence about fraternities: “The prohibition on membership policies that discriminate on the basis of religion does not apply to religious groups or other belief-based communities.”